


i clutched your arms like stairway railings (and you clutched my brain and eased my ailing)

by orphan_account



Series: we'll be looking for sunlight, or the headlights (till our wide eyes burn blind) [7]
Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017), Call Me By Your Name - All Media Types, Call Me by Your Name - André Aciman
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Cuddling & Snuggling, Declarations Of Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Endearments, Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, Feels, Fix-It, Fluff, Hurt Elio, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, M/M, Oliver's Parents Are Horrible, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pet Names, Post-Canon, Protective Oliver, Protectiveness, Romance, Summer Love, Summer Romance, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-21
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-05 06:54:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12789210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Oliver stroked his cheek gently, kissed his forehead, wrapped his arms around the sleeping male. The moonlight kissed Elio’s skin like an angel. He was beautiful. And Oliver was so unbelievably lucky.Having Elio close, like this? Oliver knew he’d fight to keep it.No matter what.Sequel to:keep me by your side. You don't necessarily need to read the first series but it probably would help!





	i clutched your arms like stairway railings (and you clutched my brain and eased my ailing)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [junjoutattoo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/junjoutattoo/gifts).



> You asked for something like this right? :) I hope I did the prompt justice! 
> 
> Thanks for being supportive, my lovelies. I wouldn't be writing this without you! 
> 
> Any mistakes are my own. I own no one.

* * *

Elio made his way back to his dorm room. It was after a long day of classes. He was tired and all he wanted was to curl up in bed and watch a film before sleep. Outside his room however, he found a man and woman standing there.

“Hi?” he greeted when he approached them. They had their backs to him. For a moment, he thought that perhaps it was some students lost or someone’s parents come to visit. When they turned however, his heart stopped in his throat.

Oliver’s parents.

He knew from pictures Oliver had showed him. And here they were, standing outside his dorm room door. How did they know where he went to university? How did they know what dorm he was in? He knew that Oliver had told them about him – had to when the marriage to Belle was called off – but Oliver hadn’t told them where he was studying.

Oliver’s father was an intimidating man. He stood tall and broad shouldered. Elio stepped back when he turned to glare at him. Oliver’s mother fixed him with an icy look. Elio wanted the ground to swallow him up right there and then.

“Hello?” he said but it came out as a question. He hated that he sounded so insecure and unsure. He shuffled his feet and clutched his bag closer to his body. He felt like a child.

“You must be Elio,” his mother said, painting on a fake smile.

“How did you find me?” he asked, his voice was shaking. He didn’t like the way Oliver’s father was looking at him, like he was disgusting.

“We…look, that doesn’t matter,” she smiled again. Elio found it strange. Like she was wearing a mask, a too friendly smile, one that didn’t meet her eyes and looked painful.

“Can we talk to you?” his father finally asked. Then, frowned as if angry with himself for asking. Elio got the sense that he got his way and there was no question about this. They were going to talk. “We want you to leave our son alone.”

Elio peered over his shoulder. The corridor was empty. The main entrance to his campus building led outside to the grounds where there were benches and patches of grass and trees. He had no doubt that there were students outside. He wanted to scream. Maybe they would hear him.

His voice however, died in his throat. Suddenly, he felt like he couldn’t breathe. His heart was pounding in his chest. “Leave Oliver?”

“Yes,” his mother snapped. Gone was her icy smile. Instead, there was a look of annoyance. “Is that so hard to understand?”

“You’re ruining his life,” his father snarled. “You’re just a little fling to him. The sooner you realise that, the sooner we can all move past this.”

“You mean nothing to him,” his mother said. The ice in her words made Elio want to hold his chest. He had been insulted before, but nothing hurt like that. And it was because he secretly thought that maybe Oliver was only with him for now, until he found someone else. His insecurities came out of their hiding places: _what if that’s true? I am nothing. I’m only a little boy to Oliver. Nothing more._

Elio gulped and turned his face away for a moment. If he showed his weakness they would pounce. He looked back at him. Reigned in his fear and said, “I think you need to leave before I call campus security.”

The demons that haunted him for months after Oliver went, were back with a vengeance. But he assumed, they never left. They had seen into his heart and taken it, dragging it out of his chest and leaving bits of him behind, tearing it up as they went. Until, his heart would be too weak to keep beating and he’d be alone in the darkness that crept in at night and took hold of his body.

“Think about it,” the man said. He stepped up to Elio. “We can pay you, if that’ll make you leave.” He looked down at Elio like he was a piece of dirt. He wouldn’t come closer to Elio, as if he was diseased. Elio wanted to cry. He knew a threat when he heard one. The _‘or else’_ was left hanging in the air.

He felt like he’d been punched. Did they really think that money would make him leave? That his love was entirely superficial? No amount of money would make him leave Oliver. He ground his teeth and shoved his shaking hands into his pockets. He wouldn’t cry in front of them.

He was rooted to the spot. He wondered if this was what it left like in films when the protagonist is staring their nightmares in the face. If their heart feels like it’s going to beat out of its ribcage. If their legs turn to liquid and their feet don’t obey their screaming minds. If it feels like this. Like drowning.

For a moment, they both stared at him. The air felt tense. Elio felt like he could cut the tension with the edge of his blunt text books. He held his breath, blinked until the tears stilled and the trembling in his lips paused. They turned and left through the campus doors.

The moment they were gone, the breath Elio had been holding left his lips. He sucked in a deep breath, lungs screaming for air. He leaned against the wall to try and balance himself. He fished out his keys from his pocket but his hands were shaking so much that it took him a couple of moments to get the right key. He unlocked the door room door and the moment he was inside and the door was closed, he collapsed against the wall, tears finally breaking free.

He could barely hear his cries over the wild pounding of his heart and the blood rushing in his ears. He fumbled on his knees, getting to the phone in the living room of his shared accommodation and grabbed it. He lived with two other people, they had their own rooms and bathrooms but shared a kitchen and living area. Neither of them were home, thankfully.

He held the phone in his hands and dialled a well known number. For the first couple of times, he dropped the phone, cord pulling against the receiver as it clattered on the wooden floor. His eyes clouded with tears. On the fourth try he finally got the number right and held the phone to his ear.

The phone rang for a couple of beats and then the click of it being picked up was heard. “Hello?” Oliver said. Elio’s heart thumped. _He was here_.

For a moment, Elio sat there silent, unable to make his voice work. Words were stuck in his throat. “Hello?” Oliver asked again. His voice sounded so sweet to his ears, like a blanket to keep him warm at night when the cold came in.

Elio opened his mouth to speak again but a wounded sob left his lips. He was hunched over, wrapped around his knees as he held the phone to him, like it was Oliver himself.

“Elio, baby, what’s wrong?”

Elio could hear the worry, the fear, the dread in his voice. Elio loved how protective he was. How much he cared. He didn’t deserve it. Oliver’s father was right. But that’s not what Elio said.

He was selfish and he wanted Oliver. So, he said, “ _Oliver_.”

 “I’m coming,” Oliver replied, voice hurried as he moved around, no doubt grabbing his keys in a worried frenzy, and Elio thought he was falling in love with him all over again.

*

The minute Elio opened the door, Oliver stepped inside the living room space and wrapped his arms around him. Elio melted into his arms and buried his face in Oliver’s neck, tears wetting his skin.

“Oh,” Oliver whispered, worried, sad, loving, “ _sweetheart_.” He closed the door behind him and picked him up like he had done back in Elio’s old room in Italy. He held him close to his chest and kissed his temple, walking into Elio’s private room and closed the door.

“ _Oliver_ ,” Elio whispered brokenly, he nestled himself into Oliver’s chest. He was warm and safe and strong. Elio felt like he had back in Rome, wrapped in his arms. Protected. Oliver smelt like cologne and mint chewing gum. He had only seen him a couple of days ago but now, being back with him, Elio never wanted him to leave again.

After getting back from their holiday, things had been rushed in returning to the routine of university and teaching. Now, none of that seemed important. All Elio wanted to do was soak up Oliver like he was the sun and the warmth that kept his demons away. Like he was the sunlight on his skin, the soft voice in his ear that calmed him down, before it was taken away again.

“I’m so sorry,” Oliver said, sitting down on Elio’s bed with his back against the headboard and Elio on his lap, straddling his hips. Elio had his face in Oliver’s neck. “I’m so sorry, Elio. They didn’t _hurt_ you did they?”

Elio shook his head. He knew Oliver meant physically. “No, no. They said that I’m ruining your life and that I’m just a fling,” Elio mumbled pulling back to look down at his hands, “that…I’m nothing.”

Oliver cupped Elio’s face. His eyes were dark. Protective. “Listen to me, Elio. You are _not_ nothing. I love you. You’re not ruining my life and you’re _not_ a fling. You have no idea how glad I am that we’re together. _I want you_. And only you.”

“Maybe you should leave, be with Belle, like they want,” Elio sniffed, wiping his eyes roughly until Oliver pulled his hands away and wiped the tears for him gently. “What if they’re right?”

Oliver had never felt more angry in his life. Not at Elio. But at his parents. How dare they come and try to belittle their relationship while hurting Elio? He pulled Elio closer.

He wanted to wrap Elio in his arms forever and protect him from the world. He needed to keep him safe, keep him close and near. They had been through so much together and after almost losing him, he couldn’t handle the thought of that happening again.

“They’re _not_ right. _I’m_ right. I’ve never felt this way about someone before. I think about you all the time; the way you smile, that little laugh of yours,” Oliver smiled, eyes open and vulnerable only for Elio and he kissed his mouth and then poked his nose to make Elio smile. There were tears in Oliver’s eyes too. The thought of Elio hurting made his stomach turn.

Elio blushed and shook his head, looking away. He couldn’t handle the love in Oliver’s gaze. Oliver brought him closer still and kissed his forehead, his cheeks, his jaw. “This big mind of yours, the way you talk about music and literature, all of it. Elio, there isn’t a part of me that doesn’t love you.”

He took Elio’s face in his hands again, “do you remember when we first kissed? In the grass, with the wind low and the sun behind us?”

Elio nodded. Still not looking at him.

“I knew even then, that you would always be a part of me, that I would never leave Italy without a part of you with me,” Oliver whispered, “you are the notes to my songs. They cannot be without you.” He kissed Elio’s tears away. “You are mine, just as I am yours.”

Elio sniffed and then hugged Oliver tighter. He put his face in Oliver’s shoulder, hands clutching onto him. “Elio, Elio, Elio,” he whispered. Wanting to be the person he had been before Oliver’s parents. Before the pain had set in his chest.

“Oliver, Oliver, Oliver,” Oliver replied, holding him, “I’m _never_ going to stop loving you. Love may change, growing stronger every day and more feelings are added to it, pain and joy and sadness and memories, stories that we’ll one day be able to tell people. But it’s never going to cease.”

“Promise?” Elio asked, his voice was small. He leaned back and Oliver nudged their noses together.

“Promise,” Oliver replied and then his mouth was on Elio’s again.

*

Oliver grabbed the phone Elio had in his room. He was quiet, for Elio was asleep next to him, tired out from an emotional evening. He dialled his parents’ home number and waited.

“Hello?”

“I’m going to keep this short,” Oliver said the moment his father picked up the phone. Voice cold. He had learnt from the best, after all. “I don’t know how you found out where Elio goes to university and I’m sure you bullied poor Belle into telling you, but you’re going to leave us both alone, otherwise I’m going to report you to the police.

I’ll tell them how you threatened Elio, how it’s on CCTV footage and when they ask why you were there, I’ll tell everyone, in our community, that your son is bisexual and is in a relationship with a man. They only have rumours right now but I wonder what it would be like if I told them the truth?”

“ _Oliver_ –

“No, this is your final warning father. If you come near either of us again, I will call the police.”

Oliver hung up just as Elio turned around in his sleep and nuzzled his face in Oliver’s chest. Oliver stroked his cheek gently, kissed his forehead, wrapped his arms around the sleeping male. The moonlight kissed Elio’s skin like an angel. He was beautiful. And Oliver was so unbelievably lucky.

He was furious that his parents had threatened Elio.

But having Elio close, like this? Oliver knew he’d fight to keep it. No matter what.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if I need to put any warnings or if anything is wrong :) 
> 
> Comments, kudos and bookmarks are appreciated!


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